With what happened last year anyone know we have now been at two services for one full year that went by really fast so so it's good to see. I don't know if it's good that time goes by fast but I guess in one way it is well last week you know I got up here and Imade a rookie mistake I can't believe I did this I said I thought summer was going to be over what a fool want to end this soon as you think you know it's going to happen and so if the weather forecast said it wasgoing to be in the ninety's you know here in Phoenix you're excited when he gets out of the hundreds and then we're really excited when he gets out of the ninety's eventually but you know I'm eating my words andthat's that's the danger of speaking in public right soon as you say something you can't take it back and you can be proved wrong and insured that's pretty significant So I'm very careful with what I say I'm glad thatwe're not under the law we're under grace because you know what happens to false prophets of the Old Testament you stone them to death so. We're not going to do that when we are in a series about church andwe've been talking about our mission statement our values our mission statement here the reason why we exist is to help people become committed followers of Christ through the teaching and preaching of God'sword and we've talked about what a follower of Christ does a follower of Christ fulfills the two greatest commandment some might be the best and easiest way to describe what a follower of Christ does that means welove the Lord our God with all of our heart and soul and strength and we love our neighbor as yourself and so we've been talking about that healthy relationships these past three weeks and the phrase that we'reborrowing from another church says that we want to see people develop intimacy with God community with insiders and influence with outsiders next week we're going to look at another value of ours faithful serviceand we're doing that in conjunction with our ministry Farrah's So there's kind of a methodology it's madness and so we'll talk about faithful service how God has made us to serve him in some special way and then youcan have an opportunity possibly to think about how you. Get involved in our church but today we're going to talk about our most important value as a church and that is the foundation upon which we do everythingat our church and that value is Bible centered cheating in preaching and so why is the Bible so important why do we call ourselves Grace Bible Church so this morning we're going to look at three main passages thatthe Bible teaches us about the Bible itself and I want you to open your Bibles for the first point to second Peter chapter one. Second Peter chapter one. And this is the first reason why we value Bible center teaching and preaching and the reason is this the first reason is because God wrote this. We value the Bible because God wrote the Bible so first Peter secondPeter virtue after one beginning in verse nineteen. It says and we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place until the day dawns in the morning star rises in your hearts knowing this first ofall that no prophecy of scripture comes from someone's own interpretation for no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit and so we havehere in the Bible are the words of God as he spoke through men in the Holy Spirit you know we live in a in an age an interesting age and it seems like the last maybe fifteen twenty years that this is really become truewe live in the age of information overload. Anyone who has an opinion about anything has multiple ways to share their opinion with the world we have Instagram Twitter Facebook. You Tube and there's probablyanother twenty five ways for people to to let the world know their opinions and honestly part of that's really good some people have some really good ideas and it's great that they have all these these platforms inthese ways to to let the world know also there's also a bad side to that there's a lot of misinformation out there and people can be spreading that and if you want to you can read about people's opinions all day longevery day and you'll never get your if your fill of it you know something going to kind of goes through my mind when it comes to us and our own our own ideas and our own thoughts as human beings we are finite andwe're very limited in or understanding of what's going on in the world we see things every one of us sees things through our own lens all of us live in a specific time. And a location and we are all a specific genderspecific age and so we all have these these limitations. That's why God's word is so important because God spoke to us and his voice is three of human limitations he is the creator and so he knows how things aresupposed to be so when we read His word we're getting the most pure form of wisdom on earth you know I'm very encouraged whenever we have someone visit the church and they make a comment like this youknow it's so nice or strange to go to a church that actually teaches the Bible and I'm shocked that we actually get those comments I think you know what are the other judges doing my of my opinions are probably asgood as really nothing that's why I don't come up here and talk to you about my opinions that's why when we go to Sunday School classes we say OK open your Bible so this page God wrote his word and so that'swhy we value Bible center teaching and preach and so that's the first reason why that's our most important value because God wrote it the second reason is because the Bible is a spiritual book. The Bible is a spiritualbook. You know there's a lot of good books out there I didn't really like reading when I was younger and when I got into college and especially after I love books and I love reading good books and I'm sure many ofyou probably have a list of your favorite books your favorite all time books you know I went on and I was kind of curious you know one of the best selling books of all time and so I googled it because you know how it'swhere all the information is and I think this was on with a P.D. and I can't verify how accurate this is but it came up with the top ten books of all time and so I'm going to give them to you OK and executing the Biblebecause you know spoiler alert it's by far the popular most popular seller of all time but can anyone tell me what you think according to the source either and don't google it get off your phones right now. Anyone tellme what they believe is the number one selling book of all time I'll be shocked if you know this it was written in sixteen or five. Don Quixote five hundred million copies I remember learning about Don Quixote when I was in Spanish class and all I remember is he was a crazy guy that attacked a windmill That's all I remember about Don Quixotesecond leading again according to the source Charles Dickens book from eight hundred fifty nine A Tale of Two Cities two hundred million books Jr Tolkien he wrote a couple books in the top five both of them LordOf The Rings and then also the Hobbit hundred fifty in the one hundred million French book the little princesses number four never heard of that and number five a very recent book series Harry Potter that's in the topfive of all time you know these books are popular for good reasons their own imaginative their They're full of the drama they're very inspiring you know they're kind of captivating but they can't do what the numberone selling book of all time can do it cannot transform someone from spiritually dead to a lie. This book has. Words of Life and in fact speaking of how many books or how many copies of the Bible there are a one source said that between the years eight hundred fifteen and one nine hundred seventy five overtwo point five billion copies were printed. That's just those years and since then about an additional five billion copies have been printed and in this day and age of think it's almost impossible because everyone nowthey have it on your phone you have it on your i Pad and all of those and how many of you here have at least one the Bible for every person in your house in your house most of almost every single person I was in myoffice and I was counting all the bibles they have in one of my bookshelves I have twelve Bibles in my bookshelf right there plus this in plus the ones at home and so we have we have so many Bible so many so muchaccess to the Word of God I want you to turn in your Bibles to Hebrews Chapter four. Hebrews Chapter four beginning in verse twelve. And this is probably my favorite verse in the Bible about the Bible Hebrews Chapter four beginning in verse twelve this is I think the verse it's printed on your bulletins this is what the Bible says about itself. Says for the Word of God is living an active sharper than a two edged sword piercing to the division of soul and of spirit of joints and to morrow. In discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart and no creatureis hidden from his sight but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account. You know the Bible it says it is so true you read this and how many times have you read the Word of God andit just kind of pierced you to the heart it exposes your wrong thoughts sometimes even your wrong actions but more importantly it can motivate us and it can give us hope and why is that it's because it's true Godgave us the word of God and it's true and it's a spiritual book and so we can base our entire lives on the truthfulness and the timelessness of God's word so that's why we as a church value Bible center teaching inpreaching and the third reason is we're going to spend the most time on this the third reason why we value Bible is we have this valuable center teaching preaching is because the Bible is useful it works when youread it and you put it into practice it makes a difference in your life if God wrote it in a spiritual then it has to be useful if it didn't work people would read it and it wouldn't be the most widely read book of all timewhen you open your Bibles to second Timothy Chapter three. Second some of the chapters three in all these passages that we're looking at today or are fairly well known in common and I'm sure that there are some Awana kids or former WANT TO kids are like yeah I memorizethis verse I know this verse I have it memorized second simile chapter three verse sixteen and seven. This is why we value the Bible same time of the three sixteen seventeen says All Scripture is breathed out by Godand profitable for teaching for reproof for correction for training in righteousness that the man of God may be complete and quick for every good work and so the Bible is described as many things in this verse so let'stake a look at them in the first thing it says is the Bible is profitable and this word means that it's serviceable it's helpful it's advantageous and this means more than just the fact that it is true and it has correctinformation in it it's actually helpful to us like a guess an example of the difference between truth and truth that is helpful in this day and age we no longer pull the maps out of our glove compartment right now youknow you we have G.P.S. and if you want to know where you're going to try to go you can put on your phone you can look up on the computer and you can say this location I'm trying to get to it's it's at this point inthis location on the earth that is a truth. Sometimes the truth is not very beneficial but the G.P.S. will actually say not only is this the location but this is how to get there and how that's beneficial it will say this is thefastest route that you can take or this is how long it's going to take you to get to that route and if you make a wrong turn it will know reroute you and so there's a difference between just how the truth the truth that ishelpful and the Bible gives us truth that is helpful in the benefits us you know this word for beneficial it's used a couple other places in the Bible one is in first Timothy I'll read this for you first of the four verses seventhrough nine and it says have nothing to do with irreverent silly myths but rather train yourselves for godliness for while bodily training is of some value Godliness is of value in every way as it holds promise for thepresent life and also for the. Life to come the saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance so this teaches us that when you put into practice what God's word says it values it benefits us in every possible wayso this is the reason why we value the Bible it's true it's timeless the teachings and here they work and they work in a way that is profitable or beneficial to us and also to the four ways that Paul says we can benefit fromthem look again a verse sixteen that says All Scripture is breathed out by God and it's profitable for let's take a look at all for these for teaching for reproof for correction and for training in righteousness now the wordhere for teaching is the Greek word. And it kind of has the idea of teaching or giving instruction or precepts or doctrine and so maybe a good way to think about this is this is this is talking about more than just facts it gives us truth and it's important forus to recognize the difference between that a fact can be temporary. A truth is timeless and it's eternal life for instance the fact is that you at this moment in time way very specific weight right but Thanksgiving's coming that fact is probably going to change right or right now the fact isthat the Dow Jones Industrial Average is a twenty two thousand eight hundred seventy one points that fact is going to change as soon as the market opens on Monday morning so a truth is something that is based onhow God designed life to work and specifically truth about relationships our relationship with God our relationship with other others and so truths are timeless and when we turn to God's word so we can learn aboutthese timeless truths and so the world is rejecting the idea that there are truths in God's Word that are timeless because what do we always hear people say well Times change times are changing so that no longerapplies you know what you. Used to be true at a certain time but it's no longer true today are we dealing with facts are we dealing with truth God's principles don't change and so if truth not facts but if truth changesover time then what does it tell us about the Bible it's not useful it's not profitable it's not beneficial at all but the opposite is true and this is what we believe if truth does not change because truth is given to us by anall powerful creator then it is in the Bible and by reading and believing the truth it will benefit us so what are some truths that the Bible teaches us there's obviously many but I'm going to give you one verse that hasmaybe the two most important truths in the entire Word of God and Romans three twenty three and twenty four you can turn there if you like Romans three twenty three and twenty four but in this verse we have twotruths that are. Of eternal significance the first truth is Romans three twenty three for ALL have sinned and fall short of the glory of God That is a truth every single human being born into the world because they were born through aman and a woman they are sinners and they fall short of God's glory and that's a problem that truth should cause us to say Oh so what are we supposed to do when the very next verse it gives us another truth versetwenty four and we are justified by his grace as a gift through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus whom God put forward as a propane by His blood to be received by faith and so those are two truths that we cannotsave ourselves we are sinners but the God saved us through the death and resurrection of his son so when it comes to truth the Bible is useful for that so where do you turn to for truth you know you know we alwaysgo online and there's T.V. shows. And there's all different things that we can look to but there is a Creator and God is given us he's made life to work in a certain way and he is filled the Word of God with truth and sothe Bible is profitable for teaching or learning truth this verse also tells us that it is also profitable for reproof or rebuking and what this word means is something that by which a thing is proved or tested All right soreproof means if something is true you'll be able to prove that it's true if something is bad ish there should be proof and evidence that it's bad if something is good there should be proof and evidence that is good orsome of the truth of the Bible gives us a sense do not lie do not steal do not give false testimony do not cover it. Has anyone in your life ever done any of those things to you. Probably so and how did you feel about it in her it probably heard it kind of affected your relationship. Do you think people two or three thousand years ago if someone lie or they stole from them do you think that they were affected the same way that we are affected today when it happens absolutely it's because truthcan be proven and so that's one way that we can look at the Word of God and say it's good for reproof it will prove that it is true it is a kind of house and self-evidence another way that the Bible is used for reproof toconfirm something not just the moral aspects of the Word of God but the prophecy you know last week I stood up and I prophesied that were done with summer and I was wrong right well you know how many timesin the Word of God God said I will do this and you can turn the page and you can see he did exactly what he said he was going to do and so through the prophecies we see that the prophecy the Word of God is goodfor reproof in fact I'm going to give you some approximate numbers there are approximately two thousand five hundred prophecies in the Word of God. Twenty five hundred and about two thousand of them havealready been fulfilled exactly like God said they would and so there's about five hundred that have yet to be fulfilled and so if about two thousand of them have been fulfilled just like God said that they would. Howshould we look at the other five hundred they're going to be fulfilled exactly like God said they would and so we can use the word of God in the prophecies for reproof and so God's the Word of God is profitable forthat the fulfilled prophecy show us the accuracy of God's word God's moral law reveals that humans were designed to live in a certain way and when we do that we benefit and when we don't we obviously we sufferalso in this verse that says The third way that the Bible is profitable it's profitable for correction and correction isn't so much replacing wrong information with right information this idea is to restore something to anupright or the right state and so the bible is good for correction sort of like a cast is good for correcting a broken bone or braces are good for correcting the crooked teeth and the purpose for the Word of Godcorrecting us is never to humiliate us or to degrade us it's always to do just the opposite it's always about correction about improvement you know in English and six one it tells us that we are to help correct eachother using the word of God says brothers if any of you is caught in any transgression you who are spiritual should research store him in the spirit of gentleness keep watch on yourself lest you to be tempted Well ifsomeone is caught in the scent how do we know it's a sin Well that's where we go to the Word of God and usually people know that they're caught up in sin because their life isn't working the right way and then wecan take God's word and we can say this is how we should change the way that we're thinking or acting so that so that we are restored to that correct position in another way talking about a correction so importantand how many of you have a swimming pool. We have a swimming pool thing almost every house every other house has a swimming pool maybe not many of you well we're discovering we've we've lived in ourcurrent house for about three and a half years and our pool is our fourth child it requires constant attention and constant maintenance and a pool has it's kind of like life it dabs to its surroundings it's always changingand adapting well we're having some issues with our pool and everyone eventually gets some issues with the pool and so last I think it was last week maybe even on Sunday or Saturday I think Saturday I took a bottleof water imputed out and I filled it full of our pool water and I brought it into Leslie's pool supply and I said Soames wrong you know so they did the test analysis they go yeah you got some you got some issues here'swhat to do they told me exactly what to do and they said go buy these chemicals and pour them into the pool and so I left school supply and I had one of two options I could ignore what they told me to do and Icould hope that on its own the pool would resort and self to the perfect human condition how many of you think I did that. Good I'm glad you could raise your hand or I could do exactly what they told me to do and I did and so hopefully our pool is in much better shape you know this is what the Bible does for our lives. Have you everexperienced the corrective benefit of the Bible and I know there's the obvious when you're doing something and it's a sin you're OK It's obvious you sent by think more of the correcting. Application of the benefitsthat I've experienced or maybe some of you have experienced is sometimes our stinking gets off track and we start thinking about life or relationships a certain way and then you read the Word of God in the Word ofGod says no that's not how things are supposed to work and so when you align your thinking with what the Bible says then life just starts to work better again when we look at the Word of God and we base ourthinking and our lives on the Word of God then we're experiencing the corrective nature of the Word of God So the Bible is. Profitable for teaching for reproof for correction and then also for training in righteousnessand this is dealing kind of with like disciplinary correction and sometimes maybe even like instruction or even kind like a nurture maybe one way that we can look at the Word of God as the Bible is kind of like theshepherd staff and the shepherd uses his staff to keep the sheep safe and together in and out of trouble sometimes and in kind of moving in the one direction moving forward want you to turn your Bibles to HeberSchefter twelve. Hebrews Chapter twelve. This is a passage of Scripture the talks about how God will correct us. Or train us to share in His Holiness because he's a loving God and he uses his word to do this sometimes Hebrews Chapter twelve beginning inverse five. He was twelve beginning of verse five says my son. Do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord nor be weary when reproved by him for the Lord disciplines the ones he loves and chastises every son whom hereceives the giver seven it is for discipline the Jew have to endure God is treating you as sons for what son is there whom his father does not discipline if you are left without discipline in which we all participated thenyou are illegitimate children and not sons Besides this we have had earthly fathers who just won us and we respected them shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits and live for they disciplined us fora short time as that seem best to them but he disciplines us for our good that we may share his holiness for the moment all discipline seems painful rouses than pleasant but later evil to the peaceful fruit ofrighteousness to those who have been trained by it and so that's that same word the training of the Word of God How true is this how many have been disciplined for any reason if you look back on it you say I didn'tlike you have the time but I'm so glad that that happened it took place you know besides this word of training in righteousness always carries with it a very positive meaning it means that the continual training will getyou to the place that you want to go if you want to become a certain person in life you have to go through strict training if you want to be a doctor you have to go to medical school you have to be trained if you wantto be a chef get to go to colon area school you have to be trained if you if you want to be anything in life you have to go through the training the Bible gives us is given to us to train us so that we can be shaped intothe image of Christ and so looking at these verses I know that we looked at three main verses and some other verses you see the Bible tells us how important it is in a think it proves itself to us there is no other sourceof information. On earth that does what the Bible does and that's why we value Bible central teaching and preaching so much and our church what I want to do is I want to close by looking at one more passage I wantyou to turn in your bible says second sympathy chapter four. Second Timothy Chapter four and this is a verse that I take very seriously as a pastor and one of the verses I think I'm the kind of motivated me to go into ministry just because I believe that the Word of God is isGod's work for us and that we need to hold fast to it one second to the chapter for this passage teaches us just how true it is and how Porton it is to follow. So let's read this passage and then we'll close secondTimothy Chapter four beginning in verse one Paul says I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus who is to judge the living in the dead and by his appearing in his kingdom preach the Word be ready in season and out of season reprove rebuke andexhort with complete patience in teaching for the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching but having inching years they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions and willturn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. You know this is been happening for decades in for centuries and for millennia people are wandering away from the truth and what I hope will happenon an individual basis is when people wander away from the truth and they wonder to something that they think is going to be give them happiness that they will eventually realize that it's not what they were hoping itwas going to be sort of like the prodigal son he thought he was going to find happiness somewhere else he got there he said this is not it and so my hope is that the body of Christ got to use the body of Christ andspecifically us here Grace about what church of Phoenix now we will be so committed to being followers of Christ in fulfilling the greatest commandment that when people come in contact with us they will see thatour lives they work not that they're perfect but that they work and they work because we are basing our lives on the Word of God and that's when we can share with them the foundation upon which we are buildingour lives which is God's word. So let's thank God for giving us his word and ask him for the courage and the wisdom for us to put into practice this break. Your father we thank you so much. We humbly come before you and we thank you for giving us truth in the form of your word and you wrote it down so that we wouldn't have to guess what you told us and Lord I'm as we sit here in the year twothousand and seventeen we can see how your trews are timeless and in the person of year all the trees that are in here the truth about how we're supposed to relate to you and to each other lord they're timeless andso it gives us this firm foundation upon which we can build our lives Lord I pray that as a church as we make this are our most important value the value upon which we build everything else in our ministry and that wewill reap the benefits this harvest of righteousness if we are very committed to being trained by your holy word so Lord I just pray your blessing upon our ministry that as we hold fast to your word and as we teach itthat it will yield the results that you desire from us Lord we love you and we give ourselves to you for your service with this we pray in Christ's name Amen.

Followed by a presentation from Pastor Josh about the Board Retreat and the direction to pursue the property on 12th Street. It's wonderful to be back here with you all again I feel like I'm I'm home when we're out on the mission field it can often feel like you're among strangers every Sunday but here we know we're among friends listeningto. Steve talk to the kids there it's it's so true they are a part of the church aren't they as I looked at the people performing up here. You know my dad and Nathan and Elizabeth and Brian and I mean I think when I first came they were about the age of those kids that were there and now look look at how they're such a important part of the churchand I think it's so. That's what church is it's more than a spiritual institution it's a social institution also and we raise our kids to love the Lord and to stand for him and to represent them in their in their generation just as we do with ourown generation I think our Joyce and my kids were in that group also the first time that we came back in three days Joyce and I will celebrate our thirty first anniversary. Thanks and I tell you that because we met in Grace Bible Church the first time that we laid eyes on each other was in this church not this building but this church this group of people this congregation how many ofyou are there any others who met for the first time in this who are married who have met for the first time here OK We have several here that's great so this church is very precious to us it's part of our family it's part ofour heritage and it always will be the rest of our lives. And it's wonderful to be back here with you I. Wanted to show I remember that time we came we stayed with Dan and Leroy also and I don't Dan and Lee are they here or know they're there. Not here today but I remember staying with them and. Meeting Joyce and from there we're all in those days you know we wrote letters to each other on pieces of paper and we made long distance phone calls for twenty five cents a minute and that added up to hundredsof dollars but it worked and it did bring us together even though Joyce was here and I was traveling around the country presenting our my missionary work in different places but we went to we went to Kenya thatyear nine hundred eighty six served there for eighteen years we were pioneer missionaries the work started with about four churches and I don't know today there's probably about seventy churches and bunch ofBible training programs and that work has expanded throughout the country and it's now turned over completely to the Kenyans You know that's the whole point of mission mission isn't about trying to us the two ofus trying to reach every person in Kenya that would be quite impossible the idea is to establish the gospel all Mung that people group so that they love Jesus Christ so that they only Gospel and so that they can beambassadors of Christ to their own people just like here in Phoenix around this church you are ambassadors of Christ to the people in this neighborhood the same in Kenya it is their responsibility to be ambassadorswhere they are and just last year our last missionary left Kenya for thirty years we had missionaries in Kenya and now our last mission areas left and we've left it in the able hands of the Kenyan leaders men the men andwomen that Joyce and I taught in Bible school that we work side by side with that we planted churches together with the day finally came a very sad day with a lot of tears when we got on the plane said goodbye tothem and we left the ministry with them I was in the executive director for eleven years. Based in our office in Indianapolis and the work continued to grow and finally the board says we've got to have more leadershippositions and they formed the International Director position development director and office administrator positions as leadership the leadership team of things to come mission and I took the International Directorposition which means Joyce and I now live outside of the United States and that's where Singapore comes in because that's the base that we use before I continue I want to I want to show a couple slides here and.Are those up on the screen you know there we go this Sara came over to see us in South Africa but these are Brazilian missionaries. We have here the Chris Myers Paul Marianna and Matthias press Meyer and they went directly from Brazil to South Africa to work and as the international director this is what I'm trying to do is get this network goingon between the countries so that. Rather than at all missionaries coming from the U.S. or having to come through the U.S. A missionaries can actually go from one country to the other and Chris Myers are now there they are working they haveestablished a new churches new Bible schools there's two new Bible training centers to train pastors that they are involved with there they do speak English but Marianna is Paul is probably half American and halfBrazilian but Marianna is one hundred percent Brazilian she just made one trip to the US.…

I'm not supposed to be around to those are gone. So all I had the chance to listen online is that someone from last week and I need to clear something up right at the very beginning because I found out that apparently in order to be uphere and preach you have to join across that gym and if that's true we'll just call it good right now and I'll head home. Because that is not going to happen we couldn't be here we were supposed to get back late Saturday night there was a problem with our flight and so they had to bump us which wasgood because we have family in Grand Rapids so we could stay another night family but bummer was that we then flew from Grand Rapids Michigan to Baltimore and then fromBaltimore back to Phoenix with a two year old in a four year old a five hour flight but that's OK because God was with us we didn't have a dirty diaper on a five hour flight which is amiracle I mean that he still does miracles today because we're here we were safe. I want I want you to do a mental exercise with me. I'm going to have an insurance agent come into your home and he is going to he's going to give you a price quote on home insurance if you have an apartment on your renters insuranceso that we can we can get you a competitive quote on on your insurance on your house. Let's let's say we're calling Raj because. You know he's going to go to Steve but who would buyinsurance from a man named Steve so we'll have Raj come into your house and and give you a quote on home homeowners insurance and he wants to know what is the most valuablething in your house because that's going to need an extra special writer because that's worth more than anything else so you have to pick the one thing in your house that's worth themost amount of money and you figure what you would need to put that special insurance writer on the thing that has the most value in your house. So when you maybe your car right because cars are pretty expensive we we have a thought. And nine Cyrano and it's not worth the gas that's inside of it so that it's ruled out for us if it'snot your cars maybe it is your your wife's wedding ring right we all got suckered into three months of salary and and now we're all poorer for it. Whatever it is the what is the mostvaluable thing that's in your house that needs this insurance writer now I'm going to break the rules a little bit because I'm I asked you to find a thing and I think what I want to do is saythat maybe one of the most valuable things you have is your time but your time is a fixed a finite resource you can't add more time to your life if if you sat down and you said we arespending way more money than we are bringing in in our house that's fixable you can go get another job you can go bring more money into the mix when it comes to time you look at itand you say there are only seven days in the week twenty four hours in a day I cannot add more time to my day I have a fixed amount of time so I think one of our our most valuableresources is our time. Because it's fixed then we have to be careful how we spend that time because if we spend it in places that don't do it any good it's wasted and we can't get it back and that's time that'staken away from something else that could be beneficial to us for families who are church and so what I want to do the smart thing is identify the distractions that sometimes pull us awayand waste our time if if our time is a valuable resource What is it that can can take that valuable resource and put it to waste so if you'll turn with me in your Bibles. To Luke Chapter ten. We're going to look at a parable that probably familiar to most. Ten thirty eight forty two. This is the parable are the parable this is a story I'm sorry about Mary and my. And. This is the first type of distraction this is the daily distractions these are the distractions that just popup throughout your day. That they get you sidetracked the things that fill up all of the time in a typical day they keep you busy so when talk first about daily distractions these are usually.Maybe even almost always self-inflicted these are things we do to ourselves take on too much responsibility we let the kids be involved in seventeen different sports that have to be takenall over the place start working forty hour weeks become forty three hour weeks become fifty hour weeks. We sign up to do too many things these are all self-inflicted bs these dailydistractions. So let's find out from the Mary and Martha story daily distractions Luke ten verse thirty eight. Now as they went on their way Jesus entered a village and a woman named Martha welcome to him into her house she had a sister called Mary who sat at the Lord's feet and listened tohis teaching but Martha was distracted with much serving she went up to him and said Lord do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone then tell her to help me then. But theLord answered her Martha Martha you are anxious and troubled about many things but one thing is necessary Mary has chosen the good portion which will not be taken away from her. We have been in verse thirty nine. Something of a rare occurrence because Mary sits down at the feet of Jesus and essentially gets disciple gets taught by Jesus in a patriarchal culturethat's pretty rare to have an opportunity for a woman to sit at the feet of. A great teacher and to learn and so this opportunity in this house is it's huge it's a rare opportunity. But Martha who is so busy misses it and you can kind of relate to Martha right I mean if you knock knock guess who's coming over for Sunday dinner it's Jesus you're not going to just. Upsomewhat a burger on the way home and throw it on a paper plate in front of them right you're going to put on the best china the fancy glasses you're going to make sure the food isperfect you're not going to mess around you're going to have everything perfect this is Jesus that's coming to eat so you can you can kind of see where Martha is coming from but Verseforty tells us Martha was distracted with much serving that Greek word I'm going to I'm going to try and six rectally Pato per That's a there's a Greek word there for distracted but meansdrawing away or in Strong's Concordance it says over occupied too busy Martha was over occupied she was too busy with what she had to do in order to put this meal on for Jesus shemisses this opportunity to sit down with Jesus and to learn from and then to asking questions because she was so occupied so over busy with the daily distractions of what had to bedone. That happens to us quite often I think we get so involved in what has to be done in the day that we miss opportunities with a Sunday school class nine months a year ago about parentingand and one of my favorite parts is that we pulled in some of the the parents of adult children to say now that you've been through the parenting kids in your house phase what are somedo's and don'ts that we can learn from you what what are some of the things you would you would tell us duplicate this what are some of the things you would say I did this don't do thisit was a mistake one common theme in the don't do this was Don't get so wrapped up in parenting that you miss your kids don't get so caught up in raising your kids that you don't enjoyyour kids because it can be one of those things up I don't want to raise a derelict So I've got to be on them with discipline and making sure that they're polite to people and I've got toknow where they are at all times they've got to pick up the rooms and they're not doing this they're not doing that and you get so caught up in the act of parenting that you looked. Pastthe kids that are in front of you. We can do that. Even in daily life I don't know if any of you have had this I've had opportunities where five minutes later half hour later. I missed an opportunity to witness that person was asking to hear about Jesus and I was so busy thinking about I was running behind I was I was late I had to get to this that was a windowI had with that person to present the gospel. It can happen inside a church sometimes we get so busy volunteer and so busy serving inside of the church that you feed a lot of people and you get home on a Sunday or you get homeon a Tuesday night or Wednesday night and you're not bad because you've spent so much time feeding people now I'm not suggesting that Pastor Josh be greeted with everybodyturning in their volunteer card next week when he gets back it's just one of those things we have to be aware of what fills our day what kind of daily distractions are keeping us areabsorbing all of our time. Verse forty two one thing I want to point out to you there. But one thing is necessary and I have a little number three you probably have a footnote after thatphrase there are some manuscripts that have a different translation there down at the bottom of my Bible but number three says some manuscripts a few things are necessary or only onething is necessary so here I'm using the E.S.P. They say only one thing is necessary and that could mean look only the spiritual is necessary all of this other stuff is extra and if thenecessary thing should dominate our attention that is what should keep us busy if you take. Only a few things are necessary it's possible that Jesus is is. Functionally telling Martha look we just need to eat we don't need a grand buffet we just need a couple of things because allof those other things are distracting you and Mary has chosen the good portion which will not be taken away from her so they leave distractions. And. Can pull us away can absorb that time that is that that precious resource. What they do is make us miss opportunities they make us. Be so wrapped up in our schedule of what's coming next and and what's going to happen that we miss the opportunities that are in front of us mere Martha missed the opportunity to sitdown at the feet of Jesus and we're so caught up in our daily routines we miss out on opportunities. Zach said he picked a topic last week that was his spiritual gift I think I did too because being distracted is probably pretty close to my spiritual gift and so I can relate with Martha I Itotally get Martha. You plan a family vacation it's not you a family vacation you plan a family vacation right these you people that can say oh we're going to go up for a drive up the Pacific Coast Highwaywhere you stay in the first night we don't know that no you don't do that that doesn't make sense you know where you're going to stop How many bathroom stops to the kids get youknow where you're going to eat approximately what it's going to cost and what you'll tip where you're going to spend that night and then the next day's events and then you have acontingency because if it rains you've got to have a backup plan to stay you don't just go on vacation you plan a vacation but if you do that you get to the end of it and what do you needwhen you get back from vacation a vacation and so I relate with Martha Very well I understand I understand the over planning in the getting too busy and missing opportunities but theother thing that daily distractions can do is that. In making us miss opportunities and filling up our time they absorb that time with stuff that in the end doesn't matter and it takes awayfrom and if I just had fifteen thirty more minutes I I could get into the Bible like I want to on a daily basis I pray but I pray at meal times I need to spend some time with just me and Godwill that time is in the day it's just being absorbed by these daily distractions. So if that's that's one of the kinds of distractions. Another kind is what I'm going to call crisis distractions. Daily distractions our free much self-inflicted we do it to ourselves we get ourselves too busy week we start to care about stuffthat when we step back and look and say it's not that big a deal I don't need to spend the time crisis distractions can be self-inflicted we can put ourselves in spots where we did it toourselves I'm here I have a big mess on my hands but I did it to myself but Crisis distractions can also be something that are external that through no fault of our own we are just in theSituation. Let's look at Matthew Chapter fourteen. We're going to look at twenty to thirty one this is. A little bit of back history of all your turn in Matthew fourteen. Jesus finds out in the disciples find out that John the Baptist has been beheaded. I don't think I'm stepping out on a limb by saying if there was anybody that could relate to Jesus in the situation he was in it was probably John the Baptist the two of them couldprobably talk some ministry talk that Jesus just couldn't do with the disciples and so when he finds out that John the Baptist has been beheaded he wants to go away he wants to getaway from everything and just spend some time by himself. Get through this process he's Jesus so he tries to get away crowds find out hey Jesus is up here first some time away let's go I've got a friend that needs to be healed and pretty soonthere's a mass of people there and he starts doing healings then we get later in the day and the disciples say we got to boogie there these people got to eat we don't want to feed themlet's get out of here and Jesus says nope let's feed him so you have the feeding of the five thousand that gets done and and Jesus says OK disciples get on the boat head out to the lateI will catch up with you I'm going to dismiss these crowds and that's where we pick up and for. Twenty two. Immediately he Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and go before him to the other side while he dismissed the crowds and after he had dismissed the crowds he went up on themountain went by himself to pray when evening came he was there alone.…

Yeah good morning. So Pastor Josh asked me about a month ago if I would preach while he would be in Michigan I told him I would. If he was kind of caught off guard that I said yes so quickly and one thing I actually didn't expect was the overwhelming feeling that I would have to not have to go join cross that. You guys laugh but actually I just finished our second week and we've been a tough cross fit with Pastor Josh So I'm going to have some references for you guys that you get to feel rightat home in this church Sunday so we'll make sure to get to that you guys have the privilege I guess most of you listening to my second ever sermon the first one I did was in two thousandand eleven it was man month I was twenty years old had no idea what I was doing. Fairly new question so I decided to talk about these five seventeen. Year old is gone Behold the new has come about cries about stairs is a good time. So I practice that thing over and over again and I knew we had twenty minutes and afterwards Brian Clark was supposed to follow me he was going to deliver a little sermon about thesesaw in the light and I mostly remember this because he had me come up as a visual He had a huge cup of water and he took a literal cup of salt poured into this water and I had to drinkit. I don't even remember what their last ration was but I just remember drinking the salt water and being nervous the whole time because I was doing that sermon so. You know so I was practicing over and over again at home much like I have this one and always hitting between about eighteen and twenty one minutes and I was right there in that littlesweet spot needed twenty minutes eighteen to twenty WANT TO felt good but something happens when you take this second step. You know you start to shake a little bit and start to sweat. But alas my you guys I'll be in the middle of my lesson and I like Zakir Pitts I'm sorry. But something happens and so I get up I take the second step twelve minutes I finish my sermon in twelve minutes. Brian Clark came up here I think he did and his like fifteen minutes sowe got you guys out like twenty minutes earlier it was it was awesome so we'll see how this goes worst case scenario we get to let you guys go get snacks and coffee early I think we'll beOK. So what we're going to talk about today Usually when I am delivering maybe to a class or I'm given opportunity to speak I like talking about something maybe I'm struggling with couldbe a awesome theological question that I want to look at could be some sort of sin that I'm looking into some sort of doubt that I might have that I want the answer to and I want todeliver it to people. I mean do something a little bit different today and I decided to talk a little bit more about something that I feel like is a strong suit of mine you could even say maybe one of my spiritualgifts and that is going to be the topic of joy. So we're going to do is we're going to look at this graph that I have prepared and this is what we're going to call our joy graph this is non biblical this is a non biblical view of joy and sowe have a few different situations up here and we're going to we're going to look at these and the further up this line goes the more joy we're having in these situations so we have ifwe're hungry in the desert our joy isn't that high the four insulated in Egypt our joy is now that we have water but it's bitter sort of joy still isn't really that great but now we're getting intosome little better situations I had an OK day at work you know our joys maybe right there in the middle you have a child he was there that brings a lot of joy. And then Pastor Josh'sfavorite you win the lottery that is just as. All time high enjoy Right that's what we've been talking about the past few weeks I think that's what I've got out of everything so. That's kind of how we view it and so what we want to do now is we're in turn our Bibles and it's going to be James one chapter two I'm sorry James Chapter one Verse two he has aprobably heard this verse twenty times probably lots of sermons about it and hopefully we will put a little bit of a spin on it so that you guys can take something away from this so Jamesone starting in verse two. I consider pure joy my brothers whenever you face trials of many kinds because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance let perseverance finish its work so that youmay be mature and complete not lacking anything. So for the most part we're going to looking at verse two and what I've done is I've created a different graph and this is what verse two is telling us our situation should not look like. Sowe're still hungry in the desert but our joy is still at the top and our joy is going to stay consistent between all these situations so whether we are enslaved in Egypt whether we havebetter water we have an OK day at work for having a child or we won the lottery or joy staying the same. So I hope I'm a visual person so hopefully this this helps you guys a little bit what we're going to do now though is we're going to take this we're going to look at some of these situationsthat were maybe a little less favorable and we're going to see maybe why we were experiencing joy in these situations so we're going to look at early Israel and we're going to go tosome of these verses and we're going to figure out maybe where they were missing out on some joy. That's what I love about the Old Testament you can really learn a lot about human nature you can learn a lot about people and people say a lot of times like generations are gettingworse the next generation coming up it's. Going to be terrible if you look at early Israel you realize there was a struggle then too and so hopefully we get a little bit from that so let's gothere so we're going to turn now to Exodus sixteen verse two. That is Exodus sixteen verse two. In the desert the whole community grumbled against Moses and Aaron this is your light said to them if only we had died by the Lord's hand in Egypt they are talking about in Egypt wesat around parts of me and all the food we wanted we have brought us out here into the desert to start this entire assembly to death. So we have three main points so we're going to be going over today and I thought a whole bunch about different points that I want to hit narrowed it down to three. The first one isgoing to be this. The first thing holding us back from Joy is that we create trials from situations that are not even problems yet I'll say that one more time we create trials that are not even problems yet. As many of you know I work for Grand Canyon University and I and a chance to specialise there my main job is to help community college students take everything that they have theCommunity College bring it over to G.C. You make sure everything is smooth I make sure to be able to pay for everything and make sure everything is perfect for the transfer. One of thebiggest things I'm doing right now and I do and I meet the students is it's called a budget sheet and at the very top we have all of the tuition and fees and everything that D.C. is goingto charge the student then we get to a point was like Right what scholarships are we going to offer these students what money are we going to give them and then we subtract thatnumber from the top and we get another number and also and they see this big number like I need financial aid so we look at fine. Late to get them some government funding we takethat off and at the bottom we have a number it is an out of pocket cost to the students and when I see this I'll know if the cost is going to be relatively low or if it's a relatively high. And when I see one that is relatively high I start to freak out for the city because I know I don't want to pay that I don't want to pay that amount that I know the student is going to bepaying and so I search saying you know what maybe we can keep the committee called Get your G.P.A. we are trying to get you some more scholarships and we can look at alternativeloans or loans your parents could cosign I start going through all these things freaking out for the student. And I mostly do this I've been there for three years and I mostly did this in the first year. And the first year I did it up until a parent cut me off so I'm I'm still here going through alternative loan options you know they would stay at community college and so that stop. OK So is this out of pocket is perfect we can pay that so you see what I did is I created a problem for this family that wasn't actually an issue so I made a trial and made something thatwas tough something that was not a problem at all and that's kind of what's going on here in chapter sixteen so the yes they are hungry in the desert but complaining about itconsidering this to be something that they are struggling with is kind of crazy so I think honestly if they were just taking their. Request to God I honestly think you are still provided themanna if we still look if we look at the next chapter God Here's their complaint and he provides the daily bread he gives them instruction on that so I think if they're just like you knowMoses and Aaron I need my daily bread or we need something to eat God would have provided anyways you didn't need to make something that was an issue that's something thatshould have been an issue. I have another couple examples about how we are kind of tend to be complainer ZA little bit I've been reading this book it's called undefendable it is written by Brant Hansen. On my usecase I've heard all of these already but you're going to hear him again so Branson he might have heard of him he was the D.J. for air one for the longest time the super goofy superhilarious guy recently past couple years he for a couple years ago he decided that I wasn't the route for him and they kind of moved on but. In it there are some situations that he goesthrough. Just talking about how much of an impact he can make on people by not being offended and we just did a series on this newsgroup he just mostly talks about how being an offender willcan impact your self you can free yourself it can impact the nonbelievers and it can impact other believers and in it he does some situations where callers would call in and tell themsomething that maybe he's doing wrong while on air and so he's going to drink directly from the book they're pretty humorous so. Hopefully we can get something out of this. So oneday he was on the air and he was talking about the local forecast and he said this and I quote it'll be warmer than it should be for this time of year. Normally the highest seventy two buttoday there's a high of eighty two that's a little bit warmer than normal and so a listener calls in. You know I was really disappointed to hear your forecast it's not going to be warmer thanit should be because Goddard deigns the weather and it's going to be exactly how he wants it to be today that is very disappointing. Brant said nothing else except for I'm sorry you were disappointed by this a little bit later the same day he was playing his accordion he does these really weird things all the time. And he was doing his bit where. It the caller would call in and they would either give him a Christian hit song that was on the station or a hit song from the eighty's and he would goofygoofily that were to play his accordion while the caller would sing along. And so one day they did both they did a Christian hit song and they didn't eighty song and the phone rang.…